Flagrancy

to Reason

Bush is razing through his cabinet. We've got the whip of the Torture Wing of the Republican Party at the head of the Department of Justice, we have incompetent cold-war-era terrorism-only-exists-if-states-support-it-unless-it's-us and Bush loyalist/wife Condi Rice at the head of the Department of State. She is now directing a purge to open up room for some more AEI/PNAC/Heritage incompetents. Peter Goss, the man who helped formulate the policies that helped make 9/11 easier to pull off and who by all accounts is purging our intelligence community of people who put reality ahead of fealty. This is what we call "politicization of intelligence": they don't want to have to send Cheney down to Langley to hear what he wants to hear a second time. The EPA and the IRS are beasts they can starve and gag, the CIA they need to bloat with brown-shirts.

The wonks at the IRC describe the expectations, including "The Democratic Party will offer little or no leadership in national security matters, focusing instead on domestic policies and global economic issues that offer more potential for building constituencies and coalitions to oppose the White House." They're half right, the other half of the DP/liberal-centrist establishment crowd will likely try leading the charge. Ken Pollack has another book out already. Joe Leiberman has assembled the Committee on the Present Danger. Tom Friedman has been talking to Syrian taxi drivers. Liberals writ large have been talking about who we should have been invading instead of Iraq for three years. The broadcast media is ready to erase its collective memory of any 'expert' they had before who might have jumped ship, new ones wait in the wings, while Madonna and the liberal Hollywood clique will have their shot at talking them down and we'll all have a fine, pathetic chuckle at their expense. The remaining territories for realistic foreign policy are ceded to independent action, and there's not a whole lot of real estate left. I sit here and type and they're sending in tanks.